What is unacceptable to you for a flashlight

I have one light that has long press to turn off. That long press seems like an hour each time. Horrible UI.

Xanes brand if anyone is interested

And then there are fenix e05r and e09r which are hold to turn off, but if you hold just a bit longer you get burst which is quite bright and painful/completely blinding in low light scenario.

It is next level of bad… as much as i like the lights otherwise it makes them borderline-unusable…

Agressively spikey bezels

-Proprietary and/or built-in batteries

-A design that makes it difficult to find the button in the dark

-Too front-heavy/very poor ergonomics in general

Yeah I’m trying to avoid having my lights being percieved as a weapon.

I want to say being made/assembled in China but I own some Fenix and LED Lensers. I’d spend more and go way out of the way to gte made in USA/EU though.

Built-in/non-removable batteries that prohibit a quick on the go cell swap. I only have one light with a proprietary cell but it will take normal cells too (Olight 16340…proprietary only for the mag charging)…even if a cell is proprietary at least if it can be swapped then you aren’t stuck without a light waiting for recharging. I don’t like the recent trend of proprietary protected cells where standard (cheaper, often better) cells can’t be used.

Strobe in main mode rotation, although thankfully that’s nearly a thing of the past except with the cheapest lights.

I’m getting to where I might pass on lights that use a solid post contact on the driver instead of a spring, but it depends on the light. Sadly that trend has really taken hold and doesn’t seem like it will go away since it also allows cheap implementation of reasonably effective reverse polarity physical protection. Sure is a pain with larger/heavier cells sometimes, though.

*Assembled in the USA?

I don’t mind it because sometimes I will use it if it’s there but I can do without. I haven’t found one that charges properly yet. Its either overcharge/undercharge or both. Like there will be some crappy button top that you know you have to charge at 500mah and then you plug in the usb-C cable and immediately sending 2.4amps but then it never charges past 4.1V no matter what charger you use. And some that don’t seem to have a real CC charging stage more like stepped ramping where it just drops in 400mah increments.

I’d sure love to buy Made in USA but sometimes that is good as you get from some companies like Streamlight.

Are there any 100% made in the USA? Theres definitely a chip or an LED in there not made in the US.

I don't like lights that -

have artifacts and holes in the light beam

have switches that are difficult to locate (in the dark)

do NOT have mode memory

where the body design is too complicated with dips and rises

use proprietary cells ONLY

are unreliable and not shock resistant (to a degree)

the light output level is not properly regulated where the beam output (slowly) ramps down

do NOT have an easy to use user interface with the minimum amount of switch clicks required to set whatever options that are wanted

Agree on the E09R. Really a shame sinc it’s a nice compact light

Controls complicated enough that I can’t loan it to another person.

Proprietary batteries and/or non removable batteries are a total deal breaker as is hold for off.

That’s not a flaw it’s a feature

True true !

Cool tint and ugly beam patterns. (Throwers can be cool but thats about it.)

zoulas, this is a good post to point manufacturers too

this deserves separate poll with all the possible options of multiple choice

for me:

proprietary battery \ charge connector (100% deal killer if battery is built-in, hello, Imalent)

primitive UI with no shortcuts to ultralow \ turbo, no lock mode (hello, Fenix)

zigzag thermal regulation ( hello, Klarus)

parasite tint like in lower modes of SFT40 (lots of big brands` models suck here)

Timed step down and lack of mode memory.

Oh hell, wow…

1. Next-mode memory or lack of memory.
2. Long memory catch 2 to 8-second memory catch.
3. Visible PWM.
4. Double-click for turbo.
5. Anduril or unregulated.
6. Head-heavy.
7. Multiple level step-downs.
8. Reverse clickies.
9. Multiple switch activation so that the tailcap has ONLY turbo no matter what.
10. Any flickering at all.

For starters.